Chatting with a Young Prostitute at the Four Way Stop.

She was eying the traffic and even approaching a few cars before Lily and I got to the intersection. She said to me Didn't you have two dogs, Edgewater Drive? Yes, 13 years ago I had two dogs. She must've been a kid then. She looked at me again. You had a brown one? Yes, I did, and she died of kidney nephritis from Lyme disease. That's why. . . She interrupted me; You pick them off? No, the ticks are the size of a freckle, too tiny to see. She eyed a green truck and yelled MASS! - did she mean Massachusetts? - and ran up to the truck window, three guys in the cab. Then she came back. I watched her eyes as I continued to tell her about Lyme disease. I give my dog a Lyme prevention shot once a year and the pest prevention goop on the back of the neck once a month. Her eyes were on the traffic the whole time. She was working. More than you wanted to know? She nodded yes. I walked away. I felt so sorry for her.